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Strike Ending & Amazon Antitrust - Streaming Services: Power Rankings, FALL 2023
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<blockquote data-quote="Ruin Explorer" data-source="post: 9186274" data-attributes="member: 18"><p>If you've got some hard figures to back that up, it would be helpful, though not required.</p><p></p><p>It seems more correct to say, "based on industry analyst <em>estimates</em>, it is <em>believed</em> that other streaming companies are operating at a loss" - based on what I can easily find out anyway. For example, I can't find anyone claiming hard figures to back up that Apple TV+ is running at a loss, just estimates/guesses from analysts. I would imagine Prime and D+ are also somewhat shrouded.</p><p></p><p>Also why is Hulu not counted as profitable if Netflix is? I don't really understand your rationale. Is it merely because Hulu is in the process of being acquired by Disney?</p><p></p><p>Like I've said, I'm skeptical as to whether this is a viable longer-term strategy, because you're burning the goodwill of your customers whilst repeatedly ratcheting prices and making your product offering look worse and worse to consumers. But the Suits path looks more like a realistic one, which is for Netflix to stop focusing on pumping out expensive new content, which is of variable quality, and it which it immediately cancels if it's not a truly huge hit, and focus on being a repository for shows that people casually want to watch/re-watch. That's kind of return to how Netflix was, say, a decade ago - or perhaps a middle place between there and the massive content-pumping of recent years.</p><p></p><p>I get that this is/was the "received wisdom", but I'm really wondering how well it actually works, and if it's perhaps declining a bit as a good way to get customers. What would your recent (i.e. 2023) examples be for successful event programming? I mean clearly exclusivity is a thing - if you're the <em>only</em> place to get series X or movie X then that's going to draw some customers, but it feels to me like Suits was more of an "event" despite being entirely outside the control/influence of Netflix than anything else recent. I guess there's Stranger Things? It seems like you really need a massive hit to move the needle here. I guess a more complex question is what's the difference between "event TV" and "building a credible exclusive library". Because Apple TV+ definitely would like be doing "event TV" and kind of got that with Severance, but seems to be fairly content building up a library of definitely high-quality* shows, and the same analysts who say it's currently making a loss predict profitability in 2025 - despite being a lot smaller in terms of userbase than some services. So you mention them "burning money for us", but it seems like the same sources that say that's happening now predict it will pay off shortly.</p><p></p><p>As an aside, the Suits phenom isn't entirely new. We had similar things happen with The Office (US) and Friends in previous years. Netflix has an advantage here in that it has a large installed user base and it's spread throughout the world, and it does an okay job of generally making shows available in multiple regions. I.E. not just the US or whatever - this wasn't true a decade ago, so it's kind of trustworthy - if your internet buddy is talking about how much he's enjoying Suits on Netflix, you can, despite being in the UK when your buddy is in the US, just turn on Netflix, and there is Suits! So you can join in.</p><p></p><p>Your L&O comments are interesting. I think you're correct to note they wouldn't necessarily "move the needle" for a service that's got nothing else anyone wants on it, like, Peacock. But for a service that already has quite a lot of subscribers, like Netflix or Disney+? I think acquiring the entire L&O back catalogue would cause a noticeable uptick in subscribers or at least eyes-on-TV time (which ultimately translates to maintained subs), because it's a value-add to an existing service that's already at least "kinda worthwhile", rather than "the only possible reason to sub to this trashfest".</p><p></p><p></p><p>Indeed and I think, if we're very lucky, this will continue, and ultimately Paramount+ and similar will return to that studio model, rather than everyone trying to have their own unspecialized streaming service. The lack of specialization is a big issue for people with smaller content libraries, particularly those of largely low-quality material, which is certainly the case with Paramount+ (and I say that as an occasional subscriber). If you had <em>only</em> Paramount+ say, or tried to replace Netflix or Disney+ with it (both of which have much deeper catalogues - D+ I'm talking the worldwide version which has most of the Hulu shows and other stuff on it, not the US version though I heard that was also adding those, I'm not sure if it happened yet), you'd absolutely be weeping because my god it's a bunch of crap even compared to Netflix.</p><p></p><p></p><p>* = In more ways than one, I dunno exactly what technically is going on, but Apple TV+ has vastly better picture quality and noticeably fewer compression artifacts and so on than, for example, Netflix, which looks kinda crap even on the 4K package (I've noticed this across multiple platforms, but as noted in a separate thread some people are more/less sensitive to this kind of thing - hence why so many people have motion smoothing left turned on on their TV whereas when I see it on I am triggered and owned, seething and coping). I wonder if part of the alleged loss Apple TV+ is taking is them being willing to pay for more data than Netflix are, so their 4K stream is perhaps simply less compressed. Or maybe they just have a much better compression algorithm. Who knows? Not me.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ruin Explorer, post: 9186274, member: 18"] If you've got some hard figures to back that up, it would be helpful, though not required. It seems more correct to say, "based on industry analyst [I]estimates[/I], it is [I]believed[/I] that other streaming companies are operating at a loss" - based on what I can easily find out anyway. For example, I can't find anyone claiming hard figures to back up that Apple TV+ is running at a loss, just estimates/guesses from analysts. I would imagine Prime and D+ are also somewhat shrouded. Also why is Hulu not counted as profitable if Netflix is? I don't really understand your rationale. Is it merely because Hulu is in the process of being acquired by Disney? Like I've said, I'm skeptical as to whether this is a viable longer-term strategy, because you're burning the goodwill of your customers whilst repeatedly ratcheting prices and making your product offering look worse and worse to consumers. But the Suits path looks more like a realistic one, which is for Netflix to stop focusing on pumping out expensive new content, which is of variable quality, and it which it immediately cancels if it's not a truly huge hit, and focus on being a repository for shows that people casually want to watch/re-watch. That's kind of return to how Netflix was, say, a decade ago - or perhaps a middle place between there and the massive content-pumping of recent years. I get that this is/was the "received wisdom", but I'm really wondering how well it actually works, and if it's perhaps declining a bit as a good way to get customers. What would your recent (i.e. 2023) examples be for successful event programming? I mean clearly exclusivity is a thing - if you're the [I]only[/I] place to get series X or movie X then that's going to draw some customers, but it feels to me like Suits was more of an "event" despite being entirely outside the control/influence of Netflix than anything else recent. I guess there's Stranger Things? It seems like you really need a massive hit to move the needle here. I guess a more complex question is what's the difference between "event TV" and "building a credible exclusive library". Because Apple TV+ definitely would like be doing "event TV" and kind of got that with Severance, but seems to be fairly content building up a library of definitely high-quality* shows, and the same analysts who say it's currently making a loss predict profitability in 2025 - despite being a lot smaller in terms of userbase than some services. So you mention them "burning money for us", but it seems like the same sources that say that's happening now predict it will pay off shortly. As an aside, the Suits phenom isn't entirely new. We had similar things happen with The Office (US) and Friends in previous years. Netflix has an advantage here in that it has a large installed user base and it's spread throughout the world, and it does an okay job of generally making shows available in multiple regions. I.E. not just the US or whatever - this wasn't true a decade ago, so it's kind of trustworthy - if your internet buddy is talking about how much he's enjoying Suits on Netflix, you can, despite being in the UK when your buddy is in the US, just turn on Netflix, and there is Suits! So you can join in. Your L&O comments are interesting. I think you're correct to note they wouldn't necessarily "move the needle" for a service that's got nothing else anyone wants on it, like, Peacock. But for a service that already has quite a lot of subscribers, like Netflix or Disney+? I think acquiring the entire L&O back catalogue would cause a noticeable uptick in subscribers or at least eyes-on-TV time (which ultimately translates to maintained subs), because it's a value-add to an existing service that's already at least "kinda worthwhile", rather than "the only possible reason to sub to this trashfest". Indeed and I think, if we're very lucky, this will continue, and ultimately Paramount+ and similar will return to that studio model, rather than everyone trying to have their own unspecialized streaming service. The lack of specialization is a big issue for people with smaller content libraries, particularly those of largely low-quality material, which is certainly the case with Paramount+ (and I say that as an occasional subscriber). If you had [I]only[/I] Paramount+ say, or tried to replace Netflix or Disney+ with it (both of which have much deeper catalogues - D+ I'm talking the worldwide version which has most of the Hulu shows and other stuff on it, not the US version though I heard that was also adding those, I'm not sure if it happened yet), you'd absolutely be weeping because my god it's a bunch of crap even compared to Netflix. * = In more ways than one, I dunno exactly what technically is going on, but Apple TV+ has vastly better picture quality and noticeably fewer compression artifacts and so on than, for example, Netflix, which looks kinda crap even on the 4K package (I've noticed this across multiple platforms, but as noted in a separate thread some people are more/less sensitive to this kind of thing - hence why so many people have motion smoothing left turned on on their TV whereas when I see it on I am triggered and owned, seething and coping). I wonder if part of the alleged loss Apple TV+ is taking is them being willing to pay for more data than Netflix are, so their 4K stream is perhaps simply less compressed. Or maybe they just have a much better compression algorithm. Who knows? Not me. [/QUOTE]
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